


Build the Edge, Find the Middle

by jenni3penny



Category: NCIS
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-12
Updated: 2019-07-12
Packaged: 2020-06-26 19:07:21
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,096
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19774525
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jenni3penny/pseuds/jenni3penny
Summary: For anyone who remembers my Kibbs fic, the first scene comes from 'Habitual'. The rest is new content, current seasons. References to S2:E1 'See No Evil'. Sandy Watson has a favor to ask...





	Build the Edge, Find the Middle

_ **2004** _

_It ended up being, maybe, the first time he'd really just taken his time to actually love on her._

_After an eight year old prodigy had emotionally wrecked them all into realizing how ridiculously (fortuitously, undeniably, terrifyingly) lucky they were on a daily basis._

_Because he'd taken her to bed like she was fragile, with warmly careful hands and kisses that were slowly and invitingly personal. He'd taken her to bed like he'd only ever wanted her to stay there in the first place, breathlessly watching her face as he'd driven deeply into her over and over again - rather than taking her up against a wall (his boat, the kitchen counter, the couch) and begging her to just, please, please come first._

_“Look at me.” His palm braced her jaw and forced her head turning toward his. “Hi.”_

_“Hello.” Good God, she blushed, actually blushed in response to the way he was looking at her. “Are we going?”_

_That trademark smirk of his tipped closer, fingers following each other down the front of her throat. “Going where?”_

_“To Sandy's recital.” Despite his familiarity with her body, she felt completely bare to the way he was dragging the sheet down off the front of her, her lungs rising hard as his fingers lifted again to trace down her sternum. “I mean -”_

_“Like a date?” His body shifted so that he was leaned up into her side, head in his other hand as he grinned obnoxiously. “You wanna hold hands in the car too?”_

_“Don't be an ass.” She shot him a glare that she didn't mean, knowing he'd take it for what it was._

_Gibbs gave her a slacked shrug, circling his finger around on one breast, watching the tightening of her skin as he got nearer to her nipple. “I am an ass.”_

_“I don't want to lose track of her, Gibbs.” She caught his hand still, the sharp movement drawing his attention up as she just flattened his palm down and let him close his hand against her breast. “She's special. She needs to be reminded how amazing she is. Especially after - ”_

_“Yes.” The roughness in his voice was a combination of impatient agreement and probably a measure of lust. “We're going. Happy?”_

_“Yeah,” Kate drawled her head up closer to his, rubbing her hair into his pillow idly, “I'm absolutely thrilled that I've guilted you into it.”_

***

**2019**

He recognized her halfway from the elevator door, the roundness of her face nearly unchanged. She seemed mostly untouched by time and Tim unwittingly made a 'huh' noise in the back of his throat. A small smile went wending its way across his mouth as Ellie seemed to note the noise and lift her head. She turned with interest to watch the person coming toward them.

She wasn't very tall but her shoulders showed confidence, her steps slow but each one more and more sure of itself. The heat of the late morning sun caught her attention as she stepped along the windows and paused. He watched as she turned her face full into the sun, eyes bright open even as she let it warm her face. Her hair had grown lighter with age, that or she'd dyed it closer to blonde than brown. Still, he recognized the fullness of her kind face and the blankness in her eyes. He couldn't help but stand up into his own memories...

She'd been a child the last time he had seen her standing in the same place - and blind to her father's actions. Time and age had changed so many things between them but she still looked like that precocious little girl. She still seemed to study the room by turning her head into all of its sounds.

It had been his first case with Kate and Tony, really, the one that had made him officially a part of their team, head smack and all…

McGee smiled, making sure it was a real curve of his lips, the shape audible in his voice, "Hello, Sandy."

Her head snapped quick at the sound of his voice, angling as she blinked blind eyes in his direction. "You're at the wrong desk, Agent…"

"McGee," he offered as reminder, stepping lightly around the desk as Ellie stood and watched them interestedly. "DiNozzo is in Europe with his daughter."

"Right. Sorry." Her apology seemed made more to address the fact that she hadn't remembered his name, rather than not knowing where Tony was. He didn't blame her, though. After fifteen years? She hadn't spent much time with him or Tony. It had been Ducky and Abby, Gibbs and "Kate?"

He fully froze at the question and thankfully she couldn't see it, couldn't watch his features crumple. He knew he should have told her then, that he should have tried to explain… But even more than a decade hadn't completely softened the aftershock of Kate's death (and Ziva too?).

He wasn't prepared to try to explain the losses of his life to a young pianist who had already lost interest in him, her body turned toward Ellie's desk.

"This is Agent Bishop, actually," he offered as he came around fully to the front of his desk and motioned toward Ellie out of habit rather than necessity. "Ms Sandra Watson of the New York Philharmonic."

"How did you know that?"

"Ducky's kept track." He'd very proudly shown them all an article that he'd been browsing ages ago, when she had first graduated early and been accepted to Julliard. "He's downstairs if you'd like me to show you to his new office?"

"Yes, but I came to see Agent Gibbs first? If he's still here?"

"He's upstairs at the moment," Ellie supplied softly, seeming to note how emotional her teammate seemed, how wistful his face had gone while studying the young woman. "You can wait in the - "

"Same desk?" Sandy interrupted her as she stepped forward, continuing past their desks without concern. Her left hand went out, tentatively reaching.

"Yeah. He's still there."

She nodded swiftly, supremely sure of her movements as her hand found the edge of the desk and skiffed under it as she moved along the front and around toward the chair. "At least something is the same."

***

She was bemused by the fact that there seemed to be a young lady in his seat, and equally as curious as she moved toward his desk. She really had just meant to leave his case files on his desk and duck out for the day, hoping to grab some groceries and an overnight bag before heading to his place. She hated not having her own things with her.

The twenty something staring directly at her as she slowed seemed like maybe she could put a stop to those plans, though. It felt less amusing and suddenly considerably more strange the closer she got. Jack caught McGee standing as she half passed his desk, his hand up to wave strangely in front of his face. She just frowned and blinked as she continued, catching herself slower as the young woman also stood, facing each other from opposite sides of Gibbs' desk.

"Caitlin?"

The unsure quiver in the girl's tone of voice, the way she looked just to Jack's slight right? Both clues combined with McGee's oddly made warning had her realizing that the young woman was blind.

"Jacqueline, actually," she corrected carefully. She wasn't sure why she had used her full name except maybe to match the name in question. _Caitlin_. There was only one reference, one answer, for that name while standing in the middle of the MCRT desks. "Have we met?"

"No, sorry. It was your heels and… and the way you smell. You smell like Agent - "

 _Shiiiit_. "I reminded you of someone else?"

She knew exactly who she smelled like and it didn't need to be broadcast throughout the middle of the bullpen. His soap had been crowding her skin all day, reminding her how delightful it had felt to have him slowly massage a warm lather into her shoulders, her lower back, around her hips.

"Agent Todd." _Wait, what_? That certainly hadn't been the answer she had been expecting and she studied the young woman's face for a moment, a lump getting slowly swallowed down her throat. "Is she here? Is Gibbs here?"

"I'll call him, Sandy. Relax," Tim offered as he came toward them.

Even Jack bristled a little as he came up her left side, feeling far under-prepared for the situation she'd just stepped right into. The hard slap of realization had hit her just on the heels of the name 'Todd'.

She was absolutely aware of who Caitlin Todd was, who she had been to them. Well, who she had _supposedly_ been to all of them… It seemed the story was far more involved than she had realized.

"I'm relaxed," the young woman snapped back, though frustration finally went crackling along the surface of her patience.

So, it was her heels and the way she smelled… High heels on the carpet and the scent of _him_ lingering on a woman's skin was something that the girl in front of her had used as an identifier, sensory information she had filed away. It had been something so strongly specific that even years later it was still particular to one woman.

 _Well… In theory_.

"Tim, I'll go get him," Jack said gently, keeping a forced half smile on her lips more for the other agent than the stranger across the desk. "I'm obviously upsetting her."

"You're _not_. You just… I need to talk to him is all."

***

The last place she wanted to be was in the conference room with them. Her emotions were jumbled up and messy and she felt confused by the encounter at his desk. At the same time… she knew that whatever this was, it probably wouldn't be easy on him. The urge to protect him was just as strong as the urge to get the hell out.

"C'mere," he murmured, his hand taking Sandy's before he stepped closer, giving her warning and a chance to decide on the hug he was offering. "How are ya?"

"I'm okay," The nod she gave him was strong and confident, same as the hug she gave back. Jack watched him study her face when he pulled back a moment later, finding pride and appreciation in the way he looked at her. Hell, it was sweet. "I need a favor."

He nodded as he squeezed her arms and stepped back, waiting to tuck her chair in for her as she sat. "You meet Agent Sloane yet?"

Oh, _no_ , there was no need to draw her into this. Not when the twenty-something had already managed to make her feel about two inches tall.

Jack shook her head as she turned and tried to block the way he had crowded her toward a chair at the table. "I was just leaving."

He just shot her a look that said she wasn't going anywhere but the chair he'd pulled out for her as Sandy spoke from behind her, "It's okay, this is… I mean, it's not private."

"What's wrong?" Gibbs asked, his tone easier and lighter than she'd thought it would be as she sat, his hand pressing her chair forward before he stepped away.

Sandy felt and heard him slip behind her, her head turning with his movements as he went for the other chair. "My dad - "

"I can't help your dad," he said strongly as he sat, his tone broader and quicker than she'd expected. Jack flinched into looking at him, studying his face, watching the color of his eyes tint steel and brooding while he leaned farther back from the table.

She couldn't imagine what the girl's father had done to garner such a swift and sturdy denial...

"You _can_ , Gibbs." Sandy seemed to have felt the shift of tone in his body language, heard the movement of his chair. She leaned forward right after he had stretched back, voice bending toward pleading. "Having you at his hearing - "

"Parole hearing?" Jack asked softly, interjecting just to draw the tension from between the two of them, pulling at it lightly just to smooth things softer.

"Yeah. It's in two weeks," Sandy nodded downward instead of turning her head, her voice going more embarrassed as she pushed her hair back from her face. "He's been punished."

"He put you and your mom in serious danger, Sandy. For _money_."

There it was, disdain and disgust, plain on his face and in his voice. _That_ was it, the worst offense in Gibbs' playbook. The man had purposely endangered his own wife and daughter, betrayed them.

He'd selfishly sacrificed what Gibbs had lost and for what? For money? No wonder his denial was so darkly vehement.

"Where is _Kate_? Is she gone? She _has_ to be gone if another woman smells like you."

She'd never before felt out of place at headquarters, not even in the early days when he had been giving her the cold shoulder - or being vaguely threatening.

At least not until the ghost of another woman, another (exalted) agent had been invited to the conference table. Not until she had been silently accused of stealing him away from someone she had never even met, years after the fact. Not until she had been labeled ' _another woman_ '.

The blind girl's invocation had paled him, too. That alone made her shift in her chair and wanna get the hell out. He looked utterly lost for one living, breathing moment, simply stunned and slapped still by the mere hint of an accusation.

It was there and then it was gone, his own guilt winced around his eyes before his face hardened. "About a year later."

"She's _dead_? This whole time?" she accused, her face flaring wounded as she slung back in the chair. She didn't cry, didn't let much emotion show on her face otherwise, she just stared straight down the center of the conference table.

Jack ached to just reach out but she clenched herself still, exhaling softly. "Sandy? You okay?"

"You'd been through enough. You didn't need to know."

She dumped back into the chair, tucking defensively into herself and voice desultory. "Well… that explains a lot."

***

She felt different in his arms than Kate ever had and he wasn't sure entirely why that was, really. But it was true, somehow. It was reality, comfortable and happy finality. There was a surety to the way Jack stretched into his side, wedging her shoulder down as she leaned back into his ribs and under his arm. Her head tipped back onto his shoulder as she snugged down closer, a novel hugged into her lap.

Jack felt like the last piece of a puzzle, fitting him whole and finished. He'd never let Kate any closer than the edge… _start with the corners, build the edge…_

"Thought you were gonna watch Clemson?"

"Shoulda told her… about Kate" he hushed along the top of her head, face brushing into blonde and staying there as he sighed. "I couldn't, though."

He felt her body clench a little before finding that comfortable place again, before relaxing along his side. "Then it would have been real?"

It had always been real. _Always_. "Was plenty real already."

"I've never asked you - "

"Kate had already bought her a birthday card a couple weeks before and… I sent it. Signed our names to it, sent it to the address her mother had given us." His voice didn't necessarily sound like his own. It sounded like regret, pain. It sounded like nothing he wanted her to hear but it was already too damn late. "Like nothing had happened, ya know? When she opened that card, Kate was still alive to her."

"That's why you never told her."

He huffed out a breath, shrugging into the sound. "Until this morning, she was still alive somewhere."

Jack nodded slowly, nudging her head back against his shoulder as she breathed in. She banked her head back harder, shoving at him a little. "What would Kate want you to do? About the hearing?"

"Same thing you want me to do," he sighed out, knowing that he'd likely end up giving in to both of them (dead and alive) before the end of the conversation. "She'd tell me that everyone deserves a second chance."

Shannon would have said the same. And wasn't _that_ part of why he knew they were right?

Jack nodded lightly, turning her head right so that the scent of her hair caught him up and drew his face down again. "I think, considering the history, you should listen to Kate on this one and not to me."

He nodded before he laid a kiss against her neck, warm and soft. "I hurt her."

"Sandy or Kate?"

"Never really gave her what she wanted. I never committed to her. Never gave her a _normal_ relationship," he admitted against the lush warmth of her skin, his lips rubbing back and forth on the side of her neck.

"Can I tell you something, Gibbs? It wouldn't have mattered." He drew his head back sharply as she suddenly shifted, leaning back from the way she turned on him and faced him. His hands caught pleasantly onto the way she leaned into his lap, palms happily curving on her hips and rising up her waist as he tucked her closer and straddling over him. "You're not the easiest man to love but you're one of the easiest men to fall in love _with_."

"Not sure that's a compliment?" he asked up toward her smirk.

"Kate knew what she was getting into, I'm sure," Jack softened over him, her palm brushing his cheek to soothe the verbal sting. "Want me to come with you?"

"Vacation to Fort Leavenworth? _Romantic_ ," he grumbled even as he lifted his face into both of her palms, eyes drifting shut as she kissed over one eyebrow and then onto his temple. A sighed moan of a sound sloped down his cheek just before her mouth. "You don't mind?"

"Not in the least," she whispered as she shook her head, nose brushing his before she angled her head aside to kiss his opposite cheek.

"She woulda liked you," he told her, sacrificing his privacy in doing so, seeing how much she appreciated it in the deep rich brown of her eyes.

She just smiled, otherwise unmoving as his hands squeezed on her. Her voice warmed even further with pride, "That's high praise coming from you."


End file.
